Somalia's National Theatre reopens after two decades

For the first time in more than two decades, Mogadishu’s National Theatre in Somalia reopened on Monday to stage a play centred on the future of their nation.

Somalian President Sheikh Sharif Ahmed was one of the hundreds of people in attendance on Monday, to watch the costume-clad actors perform in the play that was filled with song, dance and comedy.

“Somalia has historic literary traditions that date back more than 700 years … and I feel that resuming such traditions will play a role in the peace process,” Ahmed said during the event, which comes less than a week after mortars had been launched at the presidential palace, according to Reuters.

The theatre will continue to hold performances, as well as a talent show fashioned after American Idol, for which there have already been 800 applications to compete.

In 1991, the building was shut down due to rising Somalian conflict, and remained closed after all forms of public entertainment were outlawed by the Islamic military force al-Shabaab which forced many artists, entertainers and musicians to flee the country. After having maintained a stranglehold over Mogadishu since 2006, al-Shabaab withdrew from the nation’s capital last August.

Residents are hopeful.

“The theatre is symbolic,” Jabril Ibrahim Abdulle, the head of the Center for REsearch and Dialogue said In an interview. “We’re saying that Mogadishu is our city and we want it back … We’re seeing art and culture returning to the lives of the Somali people.”